Social Emotional Learning in High School: How Three Urban High Schools Engage, Educate, and Empower Youth — Case Studies

Much of the existing research on social emotional learning has focused on elementary and middle schools. In response, SCOPE's Social Emotional Learning in Diverse High Schools Study produced a series of reports that detail effective social emotional learning practice at three urban, socioeconomically and racially diverse small public high schools. The reports, including the case studies, address three open questions in research on social emotional learning:

1. How is effective social emotional learning practiced in high schools? In particular, what can we learn from high schools that have developed an explicit mission to prepare students to be personally and socially aware, skilled, and responsible? 
2. How can social emotional learning strategies be tuned to meet the needs of students in diverse socioeconomic, racial, and ethnic schooling contexts?
3. How does a systemic, whole school approach to social emotional learning, in contrast to an interventionist or programmatic approach, function as a model of school-wide practice? 

The high schools selected to participate were: Fenway High School (Boston, MA), El Puente Academy for Peace and Justice (Brooklyn, NY), and International School of the Americas (San Antonio, TX).  These schools—which aim to engage and empower the student communities they serve—ground their educational approach in an expanded vision of social emotional learning that incorporates a social justice education perspective as essential to their practice. 

Case Studies:

• Fenway High School: Social Emotional Learning as the Foundation for Social Justice By Elisabeth Barnett & Jennifer Kim >> download PDF
• Social Emotional Learning and Social Justice Learning at El Puente Academy for Peace and Justice By Jacqueline Ancess & Bethany Rogers >> download PDF
• International School of the Americas: Social Emotional Learning and Social Justice Education for the 21st Century By Brandy P. Quinn >> download PDF